The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world that Russo needs to be on camera

That's one of Travis' best artwork ever. Kudos!

Jamie Kellner was one PoS. He was responsible for cancelling WCW, Batman:The Animated Series, and The Animaniacs. He also said that if you went to the toilet during an ad break it's "the same as stealing." His passing was not mourned by me.

$65 Million in 2000 is equivalent to $118 Million in 2024. The inmates burned the asylum

The answer to “Who Killed WCW” is basically the ending of “Murder On The Orient Express” they all did.

Hogan's orange skin on that thumbnail is amazing 😂😂

The best lines of this entire docuseries were Kevin Nash in pt1: “THANKS FOR THE CASH🎬” and Bret Hart’s tirade on Idiots

Giving Ted Turner a chair with no vote is worse than kicking him out from every book I've read about the guy

They let the inmates run the asylum. Letting wrestlers control the programming for everyone else. Shocker it did not work out.

My honest opinion is that it was a death of a thousand cuts brought on by several factors.

WCW was charging $50 in the 90s. My friends and I used to throw in and watch them at a different person's house every month.

The "Usual Suspects" artwork is great.

They also left out how they put Jay Leno to head one of there PPVs😮😂😂

Jeremy Clarkson: “After long and careful consideration, I’ve decided…it was all of them. Good Night.”

I can't wait for the "who killed AEW" show where everyone blames Punk 😂

Not only was Siegal’s niece dating Scott Hall, but Raven as well?!? Oh Lordy, I gotta see a picture of her!

"Bro. Im gonna be 1000% honest with you" - Vince Russo

Travis you've done it again.

I believe the Turner Executives killed WCW because they did not want wrestling

I still think Kevin Nash doesn't get enough blame. Massive dose of barbs from day one that took its time to work it's way through the veins.

This was propaganda designed to make Eric Bishoff look as good as possible, your milage may vary though. Most of the wrestlers looked all right. Bret Hart made me belly laugh several times. The Rock added literally nothing to this lol

Artwork it amazing. Russo as the cripple Verbal Kent is perfect lol

You could tell Bischoff was full of crap through out the series. He may not have solely killed WCW but he was a part of it.

Nash is a miserable person, always was. Tore his quad putting on his pants

Vince Russo ruined any chance of WCW surviving and everyone knows it. He flooded the place with shit and you would never get rid of the smell after that... he destroyed it beyond all recognition.

Who killed WCW? It was the YET-TAY!!!

Hogan is the blame and his creative control. He was involved in 3 of the biggest blunders they had. Starcade 97 finish, finger point of doom, bash at the beach. Eric is partly to blame for letting Hogan do whatever he wanted.

A Greater Mystery: Who Keeps Whipping The Horse's Corpse?

The Rock was about 15 years late to this party.

Right on time for the Saturday night this should be a good one

I think Bischoff was the only person who actually cared. He wasn't perfect, but he cared WAY more than the others. You could tell it mattered to him. And he provided the most details, the clearest picture, etc. I'm not saying some of his choices didn't screw stuff up... But MANY of his choices led to their ride on top. I kinda see him as a divorced parent who takes it hard on themself when their kid goes down a strange path. Y'know??? That Siegel dude wreaaaaaked of bullshit. Did NOT like him... Cheers to all. Hail the Cult.

I don't care what anyone says, to me the single most important factor (with few other minor ones) was Eric Bischoff giving creative control to the big names, mainly Hulk Hogan and Friends. It was all fun and games at the start when they were also beating RAW, but when time came to do the jobs and make changes, including creating and putting younger talent over, everything went downhill... BECAUSE of creative control clauses. Any booker had their hands tied because of that stupid reason, bad booking was obviously another big reason but as I said, nobody could "book better" when the top guys were waving their creative control flag for anything and everything.

Bro, the greatest trick the devil ever did bro, was convince the world he did not exist, bro!

They mentioned PPV buys. Here's some data. Forbidden Door ppv buys this year: 110,000 to 116,000 Last Year: 127,000 Year Before: 131,000

Big shout-out to Travis Heckel. You hit out of the park with this one. Still waiting for a Cult of Cornette "Win A Signed Travis Heckel" Contest.

And Great job once again Travis, Usual Suspects theme Pure Brilliance, 😂

Foley killed WCW. Sullivan stated that after KOTR 98, WCW could not compete with that.

Those 4 episodes, all the hype, anticipation, we learn absolutely everything we already know. I really was so bored the whole time.

Bischoff gets a lot of blame for the bad but he also deserves a lot of credit for the good too.

The issue with canceling the show and killing the Fusient deal does lead me to believe Bischoff's version of events. Bischoff was going to pay $60 million for WCW. AOL/Time Warner would have had a show that was still doing good numbers when compared to their normal stuff, and they would have no financial responsibility for WCW. Instead, they canceled it and killed the deal, while selling the company to WWE for a fraction of what Bischoff was offering. They also continued paying the top guys for years after the company sold. If you are an executive for the company, how does it make financial sense to kill the Fusient deal? It doesn't. They lost a lot of money and maintained financial responsibility for WCW for years as a result of canceling the show. I believe Bischoff. I think they just did not want to be involved in wrestling, and Siegel basically confirmed it. I am subscribed to Bischoff, Nash, and Shitstain's channels. I have heard all of them go into more detail on their podcasts than in this series. Everyone has some degree of culpability. No one person or thing killed WCW, but I think Bischoff is the most honest of all the people involved. He openly discusses his mistakes and takes responsibility for them, unlike the other two.

The Telecommunications Act of 1996 killed WCW!

Look, I am a Cult of Cornette member, loud and proud for over 15 years. However, Jim is incorrect on this one. Eric Bischoff wasn't the greatest human being in the world at one time, but he was the BEST thing that ever happened to WCW. Without him and without the signing of Hulk, which is ENTIRELY because of Etic, WCW would have shut down probably by 1994 or 1995 at the absolute latest. The AIL/Time Warner merger killed WCW, simple as that.

The perfect thumbnail drawing doesn’t exisssss….I stand corrected.

Hogan with what Kidman once brilliantly referred to as “that grotesque orange tan of yours.”

It wasn’t insider info that WCW couldn’t be sold to a Bischoff team. It was common sense. If Biscoff fails, you’ve got an eyesore taking up prime time tv on a flagship channel. If Bischoff succeeds it’s even worse: you just sold a company to a guy who tanked WCW’s value while employed by you, sold it to him for pennies on the dollar, and then “miraculously “ turned it around and made it valuable again. The seller would look like they just fell for a multimillion dollar fleecing.

In the end.. WCW killed..WCW -Vince McMahon.

The show should have ended in typical end of WCW fashion: a masked man hits another guy that shows up in frame with a chair and says "I told the internet I'd do it!" Cut to another clip of the world title being on a forklift for no reason and finally the show goes off the air with a brawl in the background just because. "4.25 stars wasn't in Japan would have been higher"- Meltzer probably

Many killed WCW but Tony Khan solely killed AEW.

It was, in order of responsibility and examples : 1) Bichoff’s long term booking/buisness choices : A) giving hall and Nash guaranteed contracts . He could have signed them for just a large pay increase. Giving them guaranteed money let them run wild and for hall to do every pull he could find and still get paid . 90% of the backstage problems from 96 to there closing involved one of them . I don’t put them on this list because you can’t blame a rattlesnake for biting you if your stupid enough to pick it up B) not having a clear end to the nWo storyline . The nWo is a top 3 angle in all of wrestling. Up until starcade 97 , it was executed to perfection. After that ppv though it was terrible . Think the first 5 seasons of game of thrones followed by the last 3 . C) his terrible booking of Bret hart . He had the HOTTEST baby face in the world (this was pre WM 14 Austin ) and one of the best in ring wrestlers ever . His opening angle was a special ref for a “control of nitro match . D) his ability to set money on fire! Just read about the history of “hog wild “ and you really will understand everything . 2) Vince Russo A) what he did to WCW in 18 months was the golden bullet. It wasn’t just bad wrestling (outside of David Arquette being WORLD CHAMP , WCW had something like 28 world title changes inn12 months ) it was bad everything (go watch anything with Russo on tv, the Oklahoma character , Mark fucking madden , or the Goldberg heel turn ) It was nonsensical and offensive to anyone who watched . If WCW could have pulled there ratings back up to the low 4s , AOL time warner would have kept it on air or they could have sold it to a company like fox . Russo was so bad it killed anyone wanting anything to do with it . And Last 3) Stone cold and The rock . People today do not understand how HUGE these two were from 98-2001 . This was like having the 90’s bulls and Shaq Kobe lakers on the same team playing every Monday night . Stone cold could have sold out Madison square garden just by saying he was gonna show up to stun a jobber . He was the bad ass everyone wanted to be . And The Rock was like the coolest , smoothest , and flashiest guy on earth . There is a reason he went from teaming with mick foley to becoming arguably the biggest movie star on earth for a min . These two where so good and there rivalry so strong that it made ALL other wrestling look like horse shit .

They didnt even talk about the changing of WCW’s logo for no real reason,which I believe played a big part in it as well.

To me the moment it changed was the night Foley won the title on Raw and on the same night you had the finger poke of doom on Nitro. Hundreds of Thousands shifted their allegiance that night. So for me it was Bischoff

Cornette does such a good job of giving Eric bischoff just the right amount of credit and the right amount of criticism.

I would deal with the suspects the same way the Mafia would. Cue "The House of the Rising Sun"

WCW picked a fight with WWF they were never going to win in the long run. Sure, they beat them for those 83 or however many weeks. but they spent so much $$ doing it their fate was sealed.

You’ll never convince me it wasn’t Hulk Hogan, Kevin Nash, Eric Bischoff, and Vince Russo.

Vince Russo being Keyser Soze is damn poetic.😂

The AOL executives definitely helped kill WCW, but so did Hogan, Nash and Bischoff. Vince Russo and Slapnuts put the final nail in the coffin towards the end though.

That thumbnail is a masterpiece

WCW was like the film The 9th Configuration: it was literally run by the inmates as stated previously.

Every documentary has a heel and a babyface.

From everything I saw in the episodes it was basically the rise and fall of WCW DVD cut up and a few new updated interviews

Well Booker T believes it’s Bischoff’s fault

I am super glad Nash - Hogan - Bischoff - Russo doesn't have anything to do/say in the current wrestling scenery.

Every time they mention Ted Turner in anything, all I can think of is the Family Guy skit where Lois' mom is giving Ted a bath. "Ernie doesn't like the monsters!"

In my opinion, the combination of Turner administration,AOL internet,Kevin Nash,Eric Bishoff, Vince Russo and Hulk Hogan killed WCW.

Its possible for Eric to be a hall of fame promoter and one of the people that destroyed WCW. He was the only person to ever beat Vince, he got Hogan when he was still seen as the biggest star in wrestling, got Hall and Nash from WWF when they were a some of the biggest 'new' WWF stars, the outsiders and NWO was one of the hottest things in wrestling, he got Hogan to turn heel, had Vince seriously consider selling up when the WWF was losing money and losing out in the ratings, had a real talent for selling wrestling to execs who didn't understand it. There was some luck/help/context in some of that, but still he has real achievements.

Turner killed WCW by ceding control of his company via those mergers. He would’ve likely protected WCW for longer.

I love hearing these Good old classic WCW stories from Jim. They're great 👍 🙂

Looks like everyone in that line up were the culprits that killed WCW

I still have an aol address lol. Damn time flys

I wonder how long WCW would have continued for if Bischoff’s group had bought it.

I miss WCW

like him or not corny,eric does deserve a seat at the top table for being the only guy who managed to get mcmahon's knees to at least wobble in the ring! He might not have had the ability to knock him out but he did what the other reats couldnt thats for sure

The Rock bringing back Eric Bischoff as the “wiseman” for bloodline 2.0? The Samoan World Order vs the Paul Heyman Guys.

Somebody tell Cornette Tony Klown brought back Marko Stunt aka Dwarf Dong Sucker on AEW Collision tonight 😂😂😂

The Shopify bit was hilarious. Still laughing...

A lot of thought went into this Thumbnail. Great work.

For 20+ years I've said Jamie Kellner is WHO Killed WCW. This 4-part documentary did not change my mind however, the Seigal/Snyder relationship is suspicious as a culprit. THUMBS UP for the review!

Diamond Dallas Page is the example why none of the WCW top stars wanted to take a pay cut. Vince wasn't good at promoting stars who came in from his rivals. The Legion of Doom and Dusty are two previous examples of this...

Absolutely LOVE that Jim still and will forever refer to Russo as S***Stain!

They really did mess up the invasion angle. There was so much potential. If they didn't announce, they bought WCW, and WCW guys started to show up on WWF TV unexpected what a reaction they would of gotten

Crazy that Ted and Corny never crossed paths because I could see Ted Turner being a big Jim Cornette guy. Something about their bombastic,Southern personalities is very similar.

It was the execs that didn’t want WCW on their channel. They set it up to fail.

Funny addition to this story, Chris Jericho once said "When I heard what they sold WCW for I could have bought it". The fix was always in for VKM

The most stupid thing is ric flair literally debuted the night after the invasion I still remember watching that episode of raw as a kid and thinking ok here we go the real invasion starts now and he ended up being the co general manager and about a month after the NWO debuted … you could of literally done the i casino with those 4 people ….wrestlemania 18 should of been the peak of the invasion in fact I think every match would of got that rock hogan reaction and it would of the been the biggest ppv in wrestling history It was from that day on I knew vince McMahon was a complete moron and have been proven right ever since

There was no one cause of WCW’s downfall and death. It was a combination of a lot of things. It starts with Bischoff allowing the inmates to run the asylum. Then you can go into factors like the poor booking decisions over time from Bischoff/Russo, creative control, overpaying certain talent (I.e. Michael Buffer being paid a fortune and used on Nitro), and finally Turner executives putting the kibosh to it. But there were many things that happened that led to a poor product and poor ratings prior to the executives deciding to nix it. There was no single thing that killed WCW but a collective effort from various sources that killed the product.

Poke of doom was terrible so unperfesional

This is it. This IS THE PERFECT THUMBNAIL

I think they shouldve brought hulk hgan in but i bet u couldnt figure out what mega church he"s at today😂

Elbow Pads|Knee Pads|Taped Wrists|MMA Style Gloves Past Present Future

Nash explained why he decided to stay home. He said him and Scott had 18 months left at $1.9 million a year. Wwe called and offered to give him half his wcw contract per year and a new wwe deal at $700,000 a year. So basically the wwe wanted to pay him $1.6 million a year to go to work 250 days a year or he could sit at home and collect $1.9 to sit by the pool and bust his body up. He said only an idiot would take that deal even if you could make a little more with incentives.

I'm about to watch The Usual Suspects now

DDP took half the money, Jim, and it did NOT work out for him, I'd say.

"The Usual Suspects" artwork is perfect for this episode. Notice how Russo is Verbal Kent. This is fitting because he was the one behind everything going to shit in the film.

Travis’s artwork always cracks me up

I blame all parties involved Nash the least because of reasons but they all had a hand in destroying WCW every single one

I think ultimately Bischoff deserves a good majority of the blame. He let his buddies do whatever they wanted even when it wasnt good, that includes giving them creative and booking control at times, and they obviously didn't have the business's best interests in mind. Just listen to some of Nash's interviews for evidence of his lazy selfish attitude. If the product remained good and semi competitive, I doubt the higher ups would be as quick to abandon it if it's making them money. Its Bischoff's job to make sure the product is professional, profitable, and is of high quality. For many different reasons, including not being willing to stand up to his star buddies and take charge, and most likely not having enough knowledge to do so - the ball he dropped was the heaviest and most damaging I think.

Usual Suspects so underrated:), kuddos Mr Travis lol

How did they bleed that much money in 2000 if the big contracts weren't on WCWs books

You don’t understand history if you get mad at the Mt Rushmore remark. Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln and Teddy did one good thing just like Eric is the only person ever to beat Vince.